Through Another’s Eye
by Ethan Cairns
The mirrored artificial sun that lay at the centre of the Eye began to brighten, nuclear light refracting through layered arrays of mirrors to mimic the solar glow that was so dim. The light radiated outward, spreading from the core of the station out to the three concentric rings that comprised its body. Those rings, arranged at ninety-degree angles about that nuclear heart like an old-fashioned orrery, continued their unceasing motion, generating precisely- calculated centrifugal force.
A flotilla of small asteroids, nomads of the Kuiper Belt, flew past on their ancient orbits, remnants of the accretion disc that once formed the planets. One icy chunk, aspiring to Icarus, glided too close to the atomic sun, and was deflected with a flash of azure light by the station’s state-of-the-art defence system. It was morning, but the Eye never slept.
Ada strode through the double doors of the Trans-Neptune Shipyard, oblivious to the cosmic motions of asteroids and rings. The only thing on her mind was the workday ahead, and how to get through it. Each day brought her closer to earning her freedom, though each moment aboard the Eye was agony.
Removing a worn and battered brochure from the cargo pocket of her utilitarian grey Archer-Gauss jumpsuit, she gazed at the words and tried to summon the enthusiasm she once felt for them. “The galaxy is your playground,” declared a jovial astronaut, smiling from a verdant exoplanet. That was her dream, wasn’t it?
As Ada walked through the corridors towards the work floor, a few other welders and technicians tried to speak to her—mostly those who hadn’t met her before.
“Hey, Ada. Nice to see you!”
“Long day, eh?”
“Morning, Ada.”
She grunted a response to some and ignored the others. One did not make friends in hell. Every time she saw a pair of laughing people walk by, she saw a filthy cord connecting them, writhing and black, dragging both down toward three infernal rings.
She could see those foul ropes reaching for her: grasping, whispering false promises of companionship, of love. She would not be tied down. If it meant she needed to be cold and distant, or even rude, so be it. The debt she worked every day to pay held her, but one day Ada would break free and see the stars. Besides, she had always been more comfortable alone. With a heart of steel, she didn’t need friends.
Ada activated her suspensor belt, reducing her relative gravity to one-eighth of Earth’s, and leaped into the air, crossing the yard in a single bound and positioning herself overtop her assigned ship. The devices were wondrous, she had to admit, each small belt generating its own tiny gravitational field.
Activating the suspensor again, she increased gravity’s pull and descended to an open access port on the starboard side of the ship. Gilded lettering named it the Venture, an impressive space yacht come into the yard for a systems refit. Waiting for her was a man in the standard A-G uniform, already getting started on the day’s work. Ada barely glanced at him, pushing herself further into the open hole in the hull.
“Hey, we’re partners, right? Where’re you going?” the man said.
Looking back, Ada saw that he had turned toward her, one finger pointed toward the systems panel he had, until now, been ripping out. The friendly smile on his face sparked a twinge of nausea.
“Don’t give me that load of crap. We’ll work faster alone. You believe all that stuff about ‘Teamwork breeding success’? Just let me be.”
Couldn’t he see what he was doing? He was better off alone. Today and every day.
Thankfully, the man turned back to the panel with a sigh. Shouldn’t she have at least asked his name? No. She could see an oily black rope wrapped around that man, just like all those others. Connections killed. Ada turned back to her work, ripping wires and fusing panels, descending into monotony.
The hours flew by and she had almost managed to forget the cage and her need for escape until a scream from the entrance hatch broke her reverie. Ada heard the sheer fear in the voice, raw tones carried through the stale air. She somersaulted in zero-g, pushing off the wall of electronics towards the exit. As the main space of the shipyard came into view, another cry reached her and she saw its source: the man, her partner, clung desperately to the edge of the ship’s hatch with one arm, the other clawing at his suspensor belt.
“The damn thing’s fried. Help me out here!”
His suspensor’s gravitational field had locked in place, pulling him away from the ship and toward the permeable energy barrier leading out into the Kuiper Belt.
“Come on, do something! I can’t pull myself back up. You’re supposed to help me!”
Ada saw that she could try to pull him back up, over the lip and into the ship, especially with her own suspensor to help. He looked to be close to twice her weight, though, and desperate for any helping hand. If she tried to save him, they might be pulled into the vacuum together.
“Sorry, but I’m not dying for you, man. I’ve got a whole life ahead of me once I get off this hellhole.” Ada tried to sound sorrowful, but she knew she had made the right choice.
“Fuck you! We little people stick together! I’ve got a life, too. Dreams! Money!” His fingers were starting to slip, his voice frantic.
Ada shook her head. This was what came of relying on other people. She was suddenly struck by the man’s eyes. They burned with anger, twitched with fear as he finally slipped completely from the alloy steel hull. Those eyes filled with desperation, pupils widening, tear ducts disgorging salty rivers. Ada looked away, startled by a sudden feeling of guilt.
No, she told herself. Remember the dream.
The rest of the work crew assigned to the Venture quickly gathered on the bluish steel work floor in front of the yacht as the corporate foreman came forward, grimacing. A shouting match had already begun by the time Ada floated overhead.
“What was that? Tell me right now, what was that? That was my friend out there, and your blasted equipment, your blasted ‘never-fail’ belt just killed him!”
This voice stood out above the rest, coming from a tall, fire-haired woman with a jumpsuit that was definitely not regulation, covered in colourful patches and splashes of paint. Her outburst trailed off into incoherent sobs as another worker put their arm around her shoulders.
“I’m sorry, Tia. We’re all sorry.”
The foreman, his back now pressed against the wall, seized the moment, attempting to rally.
“What… happened to Lucas is tragic, and I feel for him as much as you do, but—”
“Bullshit!”
“You knew he should have had a harness!”
“You only feel for what your corpo overlords tell you to do!”
So his name was Lucas. Well, Lucas should’ve taken more care when checking his equipment. There was nothing left for Ada here. They would inevitably get the day off and everything would be the same tomorrow. People died on the Eye every single day.
Back in her steel cubicle, nestled in the cold arms of a seven-story megabuilding, a display over her head ticked down. It now read forty years, three months, and seven days: the time till her debt was gone and she could fly away, chasing the stars.
She watched the small patch of lettuce growing on her ration-crate-turned-side-table under the light of an infrared lamp. The plants stretched desperate leaves towards the light. They weren't caged like she was. They were free of every care that plagued her, every worry that assailed her. Free.
The next day, or whatever passed for a day on the Eye, Ada arrived at the Shipyard once again. There were still forty years of work to do, after all. When she reached the main entrance, though, the sight ahead of her stopped her in her tracks.
A mountain of crates, barrels, and industrial vehicles had been piled in front of the gates of the Trans-Neptune, forming a sturdy barricade. The woman from yesterday, with the colourful jumpsuit and tearstained face, stood defiantly atop the highest pile, shouting above the makeshift crenellations through a megaphone towards a crowd of workers at least a thousand strong. They filled the entire hundred-metre square in front of the shipyard, with stragglers spilling out into side streets and back alleys.
“They think we will keep working because we have no choice! We can’t leave this place until our debts are paid, and the only way to pay our debts is to work for them. Archer-Gauss. Mandamon. Gillman Industries. The giants of space-age tyranny that built this prison!
“Look around. You aren’t workers; you’re slaves. Just like Lucas was yesterday, you’ll be used up, with no concern for safety or happiness. Numbers in a machine!”
The woman paused, her fist half-raised.
“No more! Stand up to those aristocrats in their shiny spaceships! Today, we show them what we’re made of.”
At that, the crowd surged, beginning to chant:
“Tia! Tia! Tia!”
“Strike! Strike! Strike!”
Ada had no choice but to be swallowed by the cacophonic mass. She was jostled and shoved, surrounded on all sides by smiling faces. She could hear whoops from the edges as some began to spread out through the streets. Smashing sounds began, too, a few zealous labourers bringing pipes and bats to bear on street signs and newspaper stands.
This was terrible. Ada could sense a massive web of black strands connecting every single person in the throng, forming a net that threatened to catch her and hold her forever. Every bond of friendship and duty that these people thought they had was another hazard that could bring her down.
The police would soon arrive, or worse, and she couldn’t be there when they did. She began to push through the crowd towards the doors of the shipyard, fighting the current. Maybe she could get there; hide until they finished their foolish demonstration.
Sure enough, the whir of rotors soon broke through the roar of the crowd. The crush had only grown in the past few minutes, and Ada had made little progress. The whirring grew louder, and a few of the workers nearby stopped jostling to look up, giving her a chance to move faster. As the sound reached an ear-splitting pitch, the overhead lights that illuminated the square began to dim.
Pitch-black metre-long shapes began to pour from the sky, suspended by quadcopter blades hanging above. The angular Archer-Gauss logo stood out in crimson, etched along their armour-plated sides. There must have been hundreds of them, with more coming every second. They spread out in a grid above the heads of the strikers, filling the sky through the entire square.
“Cease your chaotic behaviour and return to work. We believe that every situation can be resolved peacefully, and value our relationship with our employees. However, if you do not cease this dangerous activity, we will be forced to escalate the situation. Please, work with us to solve this problem and disperse.”
The tinny voice echoed overhead, projected from hundreds of loudspeakers to be heard above the incessant rotor-whine. For a moment, the crowd stood stock-still, and the shouting quieted to a whisper. Ada continued to creep toward the door, conscious of robotic eyes tracing the space between her shoulder blades. Just a few metres more…
“Hell no!” A voice rang out behind her, followed by a clanging, like the sound of Ada’s hammer on a stubborn rivet. The kssshh of frying circuits followed as a drone toppled from the sky.
“It appears you have made your choice,” The robotic voice returned, broadcast this time through every speaker within earshot. “Kneel if you wish to surrender.”
With that, a metallic click sounded from each and every drone. Guns folded out from side panels, moving on rigid steel servos. Red lights blazed from electric eyes. As Ada dived through the side door into the safety of the shipyard, a barrage of gunshots sounded behind her, quickly muffled by the steel walls.
She could hear the woman with the megaphone—was her name Tia? —calling the workers to stand their ground, to fight back. Ada couldn’t believe they would lay down their lives for something so pointless. Not her: she would escape, and now, she realised, was the perfect opportunity.
The Venture was unguarded, the shipyard empty. With luck, she could take the ship and be gone in the chaos before anyone managed to restore order. She could finally achieve her dream. Absolute freedom, wandering the galaxy.
Adrenaline filled her veins and she thought her heartbeat could be heard from outside, if it weren’t for the gunshots. And the screams. Her feet seemed to move of their own accord, as if in a dream, drawing her closer and closer to the lowered gangplank that led to the ship. She could still hear yells from outside the industrial doors, but they seemed far away. She felt like she should feel something for them.
The stellar blanket outside twinkled, moving faintly with the spin of the station, rocking to the tune of a cosmic lullaby. Her head began to spin and the faint awareness that something was wrong beat frantically against the edges of her mind. The stars grew larger and larger, closer and closer…
Ada was Lucretia Till. Better known as Tia, her heart had only grown since setting foot on the Eye. She had been saved time and time again by trusty friends, and had wept for the deaths of as many. She stood and fought.
Ada was Graham Parker. He had fallen into debt and squalor after a bad divorce, but hadn’t given up on his dreams of becoming a rock star. He stood and fought.
Ada was Terrence Alvarez. He had believed in Tia’s dream and followed her faithfully till today, when he took a bullet for her. He lay bleeding on the cold sidewalk, but he had stood and fought.
Ada was Lucas Lemm. Until twelve hours ago, he had shared her dream of escape, of exploring the stars. Until the bitter end, he had stood and fought.
Ada was herself. She felt steel under her knees and saw through tear-choked eyes the gangplank waiting for her straight ahead. She could see the cords that bound people on the Eye anew: they were radiant, shimmering with light in all the colours of the rainbow, both black and white, good and ill. The stars sang to her and their drumline was gunfire.
Ada turned around.